THE EFFECTS OF FAMILY COHESIVENESS AND PEER ENCOURAGEMENT ON THE DEVELOPMENT OF ADOLESCENT ALCOHOL-USE - A COHORT-SEQUENTIAL APPROACH TO THE ANALYSIS OF LONGITUDINAL DATA

This article demonstrates a latent growth curve methodology for analyz ing longitudinal data for adolescent alcohol use by combining informat ion from different overlapping age cohorts to form a single developmen tal trajectory. Hypotheses concerning the form of growth in alcohol us e, the extent of individual differences in the common trajectory over time, and covariates influencing both initial status and the form of g rowth were tested. Utilizing five separate age cohorts each measured o ver the same 4-year period, results suggested a common trajectory exis ted across the 8 years represented by the cohort-sequential analysis, with alcohol use increasing more rapidly during the adolescents' trans ition to high school. Family cohesion and peer encouragement for alcoh ol use were hypothesized to influence both initial status and the traj ectory of alcohol consumption during adolescence. While family cohesio n served to suppress initial levels of consumption delaying the upward trajectory of alcohol use, peer encouragement was related not only to initial, and elevated, levels of use, but was predictive of those cha nges that occurred during adolescence. Discussion involves the importa nce of family and peer influences in the development of adolescent alc ohol use and the utility of the cohort-sequential approach in the anal ysis of longitudinal data.